When you pair Rob Zombie and Alice Cooper together, you know you’re in for a treat. The shock rockers are both headliners in their own right, but when they’re on the same bill, magic happens. Their three-date Halloween Hootenanny included a stop at the Yaamava’s gorgeous theater.
Starting with a portion of “Lock Me Up” and going into “Welcome to the Show,” Alice Cooper took the stage before an insanely enthusiastic crowd. The fans lost their minds the moment the legend burst through a giant fake newspaper with two masked characters on either side, giving the crowd a glimpse of the theatrics that were ahead.
Cooper was wearing his classic red lipstick and smeared black eye makeup. The very talented and extremely beautiful Nita Strauss came out – guns blazing and head banging – working the crowd. Cooper’s entire band is full of entertaining showmen that constantly throw picks into the crowd and make faces at people.
Some of the hit parade included “No More Mr. Nice Guy,” “I’m Eighteen,” “Under My Wheels,” and “Hey Stoopid.” Fans were treated to Cooper singing with a snake draped around his neck, as well as a massive monster tromping around the stage with a chain around his neck during “Feed My Frankenstein.”
After Cooper asked the crowd if anyone was poison as a ramp up to “Poison,” Strauss did an amazing guitar solo on top of a staircase, surrounded by smoke. Cooper was restrained in a straightjacket in the darkness as a spotlight illuminated him.
More favorites followed including “The Black Widow” segment, “Killer,” and “I Love the Dead.” My favorite part was when Marie Antoideath (played by Cooper’s wife Sheryl) appeared. A Marie Antoinette character with an eye patch, she came out dancing with Cooper on the stage. Then a giant guillotine was rolled out by two masked executioners on either side, and then the blade came down and chopped Cooper’s head off. Marie Antoideath proceeded to dance around with his head and even kissed it at one point.
The mega famous track “School’s Out” was played with an interlude of “Another Brick in the Wall,” while Cooper – in a white top hat and cane – appeared with a bubble machine, engulfing everyone on the stage. Giant, multi-colored balloons filled the stage and Cooper popped many of them with his cane, and as they burst, confetti flew all over the place. What a fantastic finale!
There was a 50-minute intermission so they could reset the stage with Rob Zombie’s production. When his time arrived, Zombie appeared atop a huge podium with skeletons. He was accompanied by his band: Mike Riggs, the guitarist with massive dreadlocks; Piggy D., the bass player with pig tails that looked like a clown; and Ginger Fish, a clown-like drummer that had a shirt that read “Can’t Sleep Clowns Will Eat Me.”
Zombie also had two-story tall beast with horns, a long red cloak, and a pentagram necklace with glowing eyes and claws on his hands. Nothing was boring onstage; there was a bass made of two planks of wood in the shape of a cross; and Zombie’s mic stand was a silver skeleton that had six different boney arms. Zombie said it wasn’t quite Halloween, but close enough, and in keeping with the spirit of the season, there were projections of Jack O’ Lanterns all over the place.
After the creepy hit parade that included “Feel So Numb,” “Well, Everybody’s Fucking in a U.F.O.,” “What Lurks on Channel X?,” “Superbeast,” “The Lords of Salem,” and “House of 1000 Corpses,” a shower of multi-colored balloons filled the stage during “Living Dead Girl.”
Then, things got even more crazy with Zombie’s mega hits. An evil, silver robot come out with Zombie and invited the crowd to jump up and down with him for “More Human Than Human.”
Zombie asked the crowd to put away their phones for just three minutes and actually enjoy the concert, then made fun of a guy that didn’t, even joking Instagram was more important than enjoying life.
For the finale two songs, Zombie sang on top of a podium with a humongous rib cage on the front and destroyed the crowd with “Thunder Kiss ‘65” and “Dragula.”
It was all things dark and spooky with Alice Cooper and Rob Zombie. Here’s to next year’s Halloween extravaganza!
